A Caged Lioness
by Minerva's Kittens
Summary: Letting Albus leave for an Order mission in the middle of an argument Minerva worries herself to exhaustion on whether her last words to him would be: "Go, just go." Don't worry this is a one-shot with a happy ending!


Ginger Newts and I have written a few stories together that we thought we would post on We hope you enjoy our collaboration as much as we did!

Sensiblyquirky

A Caged Lioness

"Why" can't I go, Albus? You said yourself it will probably only take a couple of weeks."

"I really don't know for sure how long it will take or what the conditions will be. I would feel better if I knew you were here where you're safe and well."

"I feel fine, why won't you trust me? I don't want you to go alone"

"Minerva, trusting you isn't the issue. I would just feel better if you stayed here, and continued to heal."

"I have healed, Albus. I've been given a clean bill of health. You can't put me in a cage like this."

Walking toward her Albus placed his hands on her shoulders, "I'm not trying to." Turning from him Minerva's only response was, "Yes, you are."

Grabbing her by the arms Albus turns her around so he can look at her, "Please, Minerva. I don't want to leave you like this. Please understand why I don't want you to go."

"You're going to miss your portkey. Go, Albus. Just go." Looking at her sadly Albus said, "I love you," and then kisses her turned cheek before leaving.

Once he was gone Minerva walked to the window immediately aware of what she had just done. While staring out over the grounds a few tears cascaded down her cheeks as she whispered to no one, "Please be safe, love."

That night Minerva prolonged going to bed for as long as she could. She had slipped on one of Albus' nightshirts, and his ornate dressing gown; drinking in the smell of him as she gazed into the fire. She spent most of the night berating herself on letting her temper get the better of her. She couldn't believe she had not told him she loved him. She tried to stop her mind from wandering to that inevitable question: What if he never came back? She tried, but she failed. As the tears silently rolled down her cheeks she knew that if something happened to him she would never forgive herself. Rising out of her chair, as if in a daze, Minerva slowly walked toward the bed. Lying down she kissed his pillow, and then hugged it close to her as she whispered: "I love you, Albus. You are my life, please come back to me love" into the night air.

Minerva slept fitfully that night. Each time she would turn in her sleep and reach out her arm for Albus she would encounter a cold empty space where he should have been and she would wake up. Finally at four she gave up, and rose for the day.

Even getting dressed was painful. Every morning Albus would always watch her from the bed, and he always made a little sound of protest when she went to put her hair up. Each article of clothing reminded her of a time spent with Albus, of what he would say when she wore them. He always complimented her no matter how many times he had seen the same robes. Last but most certainly not least she would remove her wedding bands from her finger, and put them on a chain around her neck. Though Minerva could not wear them openly during the day in their chambers she refused to be anything but Mrs. Albus Dumbledore. This morning as she slipped the chain under her robes she wondered if she would ever see the man who gave them to her again.

Walking toward the Great Hall for breakfast was just as agonizing. She and Albus had walked up and down these corridors so many times on the way to their chambers, or back the long way to his, and sometimes he would want to walk them when it was too cold to go outside so he could think, but he always wanted her with him, claiming as his goddess she was his muse.

Sitting next to Albus' empty chair at the staff table was particularly difficult. Meals were always more enjoyable when she had Albus to talk to, but this morning the empty chair looked like a bad omen. Minerva shook herself, omens? She was definitely in a maudlin mood if she was turning to Sybil's branch of magic.

It continued on like this for days: every night Minerva would toss and turn in her sleep, always waking to an empty bed, she would rise early and have difficulty facing every day events because they reminded her of Albus. It seemed that everywhere she turned a ghost of their lives together was waiting for her, ready to make her feel even worse. The loneliness and worry was mixed with guilt over her parting words, what if those were the last words she ever said to him?

The stress of running Hogwarts combined with her concern for Albus quickly wore Minerva out. Her eating and sleeping patterns didn't help matters, and in the first week she had already lost quite a bit of weight. Sitting in front of her vanity at the beginning of the second week Minerva had to laugh at her image. Not an amused laughter, a sad laughter as if she was on the brink of tears. She had never thought she was beautiful, growing up with an older sister every man fawned over taught her at a very young age she was the smart one, not the pretty one. But Albus had always told her she was beautiful, in fact the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. When Albus first met her family she was actually worried he would be taken by Peri, but he wasn't. His eyes didn't follow Peri every time she moved, they followed her. Never had she felt more beautiful.

Now she had circles under her eyes, her face was drawn, and looking gaunt from her lack of food and she knew she looked awful. She wanted to pick herself up; she wanted to make herself look the best she could for when he came home. Nothing would please her more than to actually look like a goddess, but damn it she just couldn't because those last words hung over her like a dark cloud that she couldn't step out from under. Minerva felt trapped, trapped by her words and her emotions; she couldn't take care of herself no matter how much she wanted to. Rising, she took a set of plain green robes out of the wardrobe and put them on, noting the way they hung on her already slim frame, now diminished from over a week of not eating.

By the middle of that week, she was falling asleep faster at night, but would awaken with nightmares. It was the same dream each night, Albus would be captured by the Death Eaters and she would watch as they tortured him, as he endured things far worse than death. Minerva would wake screaming, gasping for air, sweat mingled with the tears on her face. After a few nights of such dreams, she stopped going to bed entirely.

The night before term started, Minerva held the usual meeting with the staff. She informed them of Albus' absence, stating that he was away on business and should return shortly, hoping she was doing a believable job of hiding her worry. With as much of her usual manner as she could muster, Minerva went over the assignments for the year and addressed all the usual start of term issues before dismissing the staff to prepare for the arrival of the students.

After the meeting, Poppy Pomfrey approached her, "Minerva, have you been sleeping recently? You look tired and worn down, you need to take care of yourself you know. I think you should come see me."

"I wish people would stop mothering me! Honestly, just because I got hit by a few stunners everyone's determined to treat me like some little old lady. Thank you very much for telling me I look terrible, Poppy, but now I'm going to go back to living my own life and you can do the same."

Minerva walked away to her rooms and Poppy stared, dumbfounded at the place where she had been standing before finally turning away and murmuring, "Albus, you better come back soon, for all our sakes."

From the moment the school term started, it was obvious to everyone that something was wrong with Minerva. She had taken on all the duties of running the school in addition to her classes, but would not allow anyone to help her. The night of the Welcoming Feast, she insisted on overseeing the sorting as well as giving the opening remarks. She gave the students the same explanation of Albus' absence as she had given the staff, reminded them that the forest was forbidden, and went over the additions to Filch's list of banned objects.

When she sat back down, Ron turned to Harry and Hermione. "Do you think there's something wrong with McGonagall? She looks, I don't know..."

"Sad," Harry suggested.

Hermione looked thoughtful, watching her favorite professor carefully, noticing that she wasn't eating. "And worried and tired. She's not eating either, look."

"Do you think there's something about Dumbledore's absence she's not telling us," Ron asked. "I mean, it's not like him to miss the start of school."

Minerva made her way to bed slowly that night, stopping first as always to check on Gryffindor Tower. As she pulled on Albus' oversized nightshirt and sat down in front of the fire, she picked up the framed picture from their wedding that sat on the table at her elbow.

"Albus, where are you," she asked the smiling waving man in the picture. "You were supposed to be home by now." The wedding picture blurred as her eyes filled up with tears, blinking them back proved futile as they escaped to cascade down her face anyway. Minerva couldn't even wipe them away; she just let the tears fall, dropping onto the fuzzy bathrobe she had wrapped around herself for extra warmth.

The students and staff grew more worried about their Deputy Headmistress as the week went on, but very quickly learned not to ask her about it. Minerva had taken to snapping at anyone who approached her, no matter what they wanted and very soon they were all watching her from a distance, fully expecting her to collapse at any moment.

She was slowly bringing down the mood of the entire school, so that meals had become much more quiet than usual. That was why, on Friday night when the door to the Great Hall burst open halfway through the meal, it caught the attention of most of the school. Everyone turned silently to look at the tired figure standing framed in the large wooden door. Suddenly, their attention was drawn by a cry of "ALBUS!" from the head table and they all watched as their usually prim and proper Deputy Headmistress and Transfiguration teacher went flying down the length of the hall.

By the time she rounded the corner of the staff table, Minerva's hat had fallen off and as she ran the pins sprang lose from her hair and long dark strands were flying freely. Albus dropped his bag just in time to catch her as she threw herself into his arms. "Thank the gods you're okay," she said before kissing him soundly. They all looked on in shock as he deepened the kiss with a growl.

After a few moments, a quiet murmuring broke out around the hall. How long could they keep this up, everyone was wondering, didn't they need to breathe? From the head table, everyone could hear Madam Hooch asking Madam Pomfrey to time the kiss.

"Poppy, give me your watch! How long has it been? How long, Poppy?"

"Shut up, Rolanda!"

When they finally broke the kiss, nobody heard Minerva's whispers of "I'm sorry, Albus, I'm so sorry" because they were all whistling and cheering. Completely oblivious to the chaos surrounding them, she continued, "I'm so sorry," but Albus just picked her up and carried her out of the hall. The students and staff just looked at each other, struck absolutely speechless by the scene they had just witnessed. Finally, Professor Snape snarled, "Well, they're gone, finish your dinner."

Albus carried Minerva back to their rooms and set her gently on the edge of the bed, sitting down beside her. He wiped away her tears and brushed her hair back from her face softly before saying, "Why are you sorry, Minerva?"

With fresh tears, she answered, "I'm so sorry I didn't tell you I loved you before you left. I'm so sorry I let you leave when I was angry. All this time you've been gone all I could think about was what if that was the last thing I ever said to you. What if the last words I ever spoke to you were 'go, just go.' I couldn't have lived with myself, Albus, if anything had happened to you."

"Shh, Minerva, shh. It's okay, love, I'm fine. I came back to you, I'm right here." As if to make the point that he was there, Albus took her face in both his hands and looked deeply into her eyes were he could see every emotion she had felt for the last three weeks, but he could also see the bags and the weariness. "Minerva, have you been eating and sleeping while I was away?"

Tearing her eyes away from his, Minerva's answer was so quiet that Albus had to strain to hear it. "No," was all she said.

But he gently lifted her chin again so she was looking in his eyes once more and silently indicated that she should continue. "At first, when I went to bed I would roll to your side and wake up when I found it cold and empty. Then, I started having nightmares about what might be happening to you. After that, I stopped trying to sleep."

"And why didn't you eat?" he asked gently, pulling her closer so he could rub her back. She had been through hell the last three weeks and he could see all of it written in the lines on her face. Her body, already slender, had wasted away to almost nothing and Albus was shocked to discover how emaciated she was when he wrapped his arms around her.

I just wasn't hungry," she said simply. "Food didn't look good and your empty seat just kept reminding me that you weren't here, I couldn't eat." "I'm sorry," she whispered again and he knew she meant for her current condition.

"No, I'm sorry, Minerva," Albus countered. "I'm sorry I left before you fully understood why I didn't want you to come with me. I'm sorry that I left you here to worry for three weeks with no communication.

He took out his handkerchief and gently wiped her face, "Why don't you try to sleep now, love. I'll be right here to hold you, no more nightmares, I promise."

Minerva nodded and let him take the pins out of her hair and help her into a nightgown before turning back the sheets and guiding her under them, feeling like a little girl. He climbed in beside her and she readily snuggled into his arms, pillowing her head on his beard and breathing in the wonderful scent of him.

They both woke late the next morning, feeling more well rested than they had in weeks, though not fully recovered. After Albus insisted that Minerva eat some breakfast he had the house elves bring them, she turned to him and kissed him tenderly. "I missed you so much," she said. Then with a seductive smile, she continued, "Let me show you how much."

They lost all track of time as they slept, wrapped in each other's arms, in between expressions of love and passion. As the sun was rising on the second day, Minerva gained release yet again and Albus ran his hands over her outstretched arms, gently entwining his fingers with hers and murmuring her name into her hair.

Gently Albus rose from the bed taking Minerva with him into the bathroom. Running her a bath he tenderly bathed his wife as she slipped in and out of sleep. Quickly cleaning himself Albus returned to the bed with Minerva, where they settled down for a peaceful sleep.

When they next awoke, it was morning again and a quick check of his pocket watch told Albus that it was also Monday. Rising, they dressed for the day and walked together to the Great Hall, completely unprepared for what they would meet.

The students watched quietly as the Headmaster and much happier looking Deputy Headmistress walked the length of the hall to the staff table. The staff, on the other hand, was not so quiet. As soon as Albus and Minerva took their seats at the center of the table, they were hit with a barrage of questions.

"Well, Minerva, you're looking more alive than the last time we saw you." Rolanda chimes in, "Had a good weekend then, you two?"

Minerva kept her gaze focused on the cup of tea she was pouring so Albus answered the flight instructor, "Yes, thank you Madam Hooch, it was quite restful."

She snorted, "Restful, right."

Before Minerva could respond scathingly, Severus Snape decided to offer his input, "I'm surprised you're both still with us this morning. I would think that a man of your age, Headmaster, would be quite exhausted after a lost weekend."

"Surely, Severus, you do not believe that youth has all the advantages in life," Minerva replied icily. "There are some things a person learns over the course of his life that can prove quite useful." After that nobody really wanted to hear anymore about the two days Albus and Minerva had spent in seclusion and they readily returned to their breakfasts.

Filius Flitwick, however, found the courage to voice the question that had been plaguing them all since Friday night. Turning to Albus, he asked, "How long have you been together then?"

"We've been married for twenty years," was his vague response. Albus then turned his attention back to Minerva and he laid his hand over hers where it lay on the table.


End file.
